This invention relates to the production of an improved titanium catalyst for use in the polymerization of olefins and more particularly to a process for efficiently producing a titanium catalyst component of high activity which is used in combination with an organoaluminum compound to produce olefin polymers, and to the polymerication process.
The reaction of a magnesium compound, e.g., magnesium halide and magnesium alkoxide, as a catalyst carrier and titanium halide results in the formation of a highly active catalyst component for the polymerization of olefins, e.g., ethylene, see, for example, Japanese Patent Publication Nos. 34098/1971 and 34092/1971. Such a catalyst component has insufficient catalytic activity and the polyolefin obtained by using the catalyst component is not of satisfactory quality.
In the highly active polymerization of an olefin such as ethylene, it is preferred to omit the catalyst-removal step and simplify the production process by increasing the activity of the catalyst and reducing the amount of the carrier by increasing the productivity per unit of the carrier. Moreover, in order to simplify handling of the slurry during the production of polyolefin, it is desired that the bulk density of the polymer product should be as large as possible, the grain size of the polymer powder should be uniform and the amount of fine particles in the powder should be small.